Swedlow Inc., a Garden Grove maker of aircraft windows, pleaded guilty Wednesday in federal court to one charge of lying to the Air Force about flaws in windshields that it made for the B-1B bomber and agreed to pay a $400,000 fine. Under a plea bargain agreement, U.S. District Court Judge Alicemarie H. Stotler in Santa Ana dismissed three other fraud charges against the company.

The Air Force understated its cost on the B-1 bomber by $7.5 billion and on two other aircraft programs by an additional $18 billion, according to a draft General Accounting Office report that found that the Air Force's accounting practices have "significant internal control weaknesses." The GAO disclosed, for example, that when the Air Force Space Division in Los Angeles found a $2.

The owner of one of Southern California's largest defense subcontractors and one of his employees--who were both convicted of overcharging the government for parts of the B-1 bomber--were sentenced to prison Tuesday for inventing a tax scam to hide those illegal profits. Joseph Kasparoff, 55, of Encino, the owner of two Montebello aerospace firms, was sentenced to six months in prison; Harold C. Geyer, 71, of Brea, who was Kasparoff's messenger, was ordered imprisoned for three months.

Three Southern California men--including two Orange County residents--have pleaded guilty to charges that they set up a tax fraud involving phony invoices. The fraud was carried out at two Montebello companies--Super K and J.K. Precision Machining Inc.--that were subcontractors to Rockwell International on the B-1 in the mid-1980s. The companies' owner--Joseph Kasparoff, 55, of Encino--wrote company checks based on bogus invoices to two Orange County residents.

Garden Grove defense contractor Swedlow Inc. and one of its vice presidents pleaded not guilty Monday to charges that they falsified reports to minimize flaws in windshields made for the B-1B bomber. Norman Gene Nixon, 53, of Orange pleaded not guilty in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana to four counts of making false statements to the federal government. Swedlow entered the same plea.

The widow of Rockwell International test pilot Tommie Douglas Benefield, who was killed in the crash of a B-1 bomber prototype five years ago, has been awarded a $1.4-million judgement against an engineering company that made equipment for the plane. A Los Angeles Superior Court jury determined that part of a mechanism that was designed to put a parachute into place above the plane's ejection capsule was defective.

Crew members of a crippled B-1B bomber that made an emergency landing here said Thursday that they had considered bailing out but decided against it after officials from Rockwell International, the plane's builder, persuaded them that the aircraft could land safely.

A B-1B bomber made a dusty but safe emergency landing here on partly retracted landing gear Wednesday evening after the flight crew had struggled unsuccessfully for more than six hours to lower the plane's nose wheel. The Air Force said the bomber flew more than 1,000 miles to this Kern County base from Texas after the problem was discovered on a training flight. It made several preliminary low-level passes, including a brief "touch-and-go," before making its final approach at about 6:15 p.m.

A Garden Grove defense contractor and one of its vice presidents have been indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of falsifying inspection reports to minimize flaws in windshields the firm makes for B-1B bombers, a federal prosecutor said Thursday. Swedlow Inc. and Vice President Norman Gene Nixon, 53, of Orange, were each indicted Wednesday on four counts of making false statements to the federal government.